How to capture an email

Question

I've created a basic Custom Task Pane in Outlook.

I want to drag an email and drop it into the task pane. When dropped, it should allow me to capture the email as an object I guess, allowing me to do stuff with it, as in save to a sharepoint location for example.

Is that possible? If so, any pointers?

I am using VS2013 C# .NET 4.0 and Add-in is for Outlook 2010/2013.

Answer 1

Prerequisites and Setup

• Windows 10 Pro
• Visual Studio 2013 Ultimate with Office development
• Outlook 2013 with an email account

Project

• In Visual Studio select New Project -> Visual C# -> Office/SharePoint -> Office Add-ins -> Outlook 2013 Add-in
• Right click on the project -> Add -> User Control

• Open "ThisAddIn.cs" and add the following code to the "ThisAddIn_Startup" method:

  var myCustomPane= this.CustomTaskPanes.Add(new UserControl1(), "My Pane");
  myCustomPane.Visible = true;
  

Drag and Drop messages

• Double click UserControl1 in the Solution Explorer. This opens the designer window.

• In Properties set AllowDrop = True and hook up two event handlers DragDrop and DragEnter.

  private void UserControl1_DragEnter(object sender, DragEventArgs e)
  {
      // if you want to read the message data as a string use this:
      if (e.Data.GetDataPresent(DataFormats.UnicodeText))
      {
          e.Effect = DragDropEffects.Copy;
      }
      // if you want to read the whole .msg file use this:
      if (e.Data.GetDataPresent("FileGroupDescriptorW") && 
          e.Data.GetDataPresent("FileContents"))
      {
          e.Effect = DragDropEffects.Copy;
      }
  }
  
  private void UserControl1_DragDrop(object sender, DragEventArgs e)
  {
      // to read basic info about the mail use this:
      var text = e.Data.GetData(DataFormats.UnicodeText).ToString();
      var message = text.Split(new string[] { "\r\n" }, StringSplitOptions.None)[1];
      var parts = message.Split('\t');
      var from = parts[0]; // Email From
      var subject = parts[1]; // Email Subject
      var time = parts[2]; // Email Time
  
      // to get the .msg file contents use this:
      // credits to "George Vovos", http://stackoverflow.com/a/43577490/1093508
      var outlookFile = e.Data.GetData("FileGroupDescriptor", true) as MemoryStream;
      if (outlookFile != null)
      {
          var dataObject = new iwantedue.Windows.Forms.OutlookDataObject(e.Data);
  
          var filenames = (string[])dataObject.GetData("FileGroupDescriptorW");
          var filestreams = (MemoryStream[])dataObject.GetData("FileContents");
  
          for (int fileIndex = 0; fileIndex < filenames.Length; fileIndex++)
          {
              string filename = filenames[fileIndex];
              MemoryStream filestream = filestreams[fileIndex];
  
              // do whatever you want with filestream, e.g. save to a file:
              string path = Path.GetTempPath() + filename;
              using (var outputStream = File.Create(path))
              {
                  filestream.WriteTo(outputStream);
              }
          }
      }
  }
  

You can get "iwantedue.Windows.Forms.OutlookDataObject" from CodeProject or you can use this GitHub gist.

Demo

Answer 2

You can get the dropped item or multiple items (if allowed) by checking the Selection property of the Explorer class. Read more about that in the following articles:

• HowTo: Get properties of an Outlook email item drag-and-dropped onto a .NET form
• Outlook, custom task pane and drag-drop problem

Answer 3

Try something like this

        public static string[] GetDropedFiles(DragEventArgs e)
        {
            string[] files = null;
            var outlookFile = e.Data.GetData("FileGroupDescriptor", true) as MemoryStream;
            if (outlookFile != null)
            {
                OutlookEmailObject dataObject = new OutlookEmailObject(e.Data);

                var filenames = (string[])dataObject.GetData("FileGroupDescriptorW");
                var filestreams = (MemoryStream[])dataObject.GetData("FileContents");

                files = new string[filenames.Length];
                for (int fileIndex = 0; fileIndex < filenames.Length; fileIndex++)
                {
                    string filename = filenames[fileIndex];
                    MemoryStream filestream = filestreams[fileIndex];

                    string path = Path.GetTempPath();
                    string fullFileName = path + filename;

                    FileStream outputStream = File.Create(fullFileName);
                    filestream.WriteTo(outputStream);
                    outputStream.Close();

                    files[fileIndex] = fullFileName;
                }
            }
            else
                files = (string[])e.Data.GetData(DataFormats.FileDrop);

            return files;
        }

You can get the OutlookEmailObject class here (Download the code sample):
http://www.codeproject.com/Articles/28209/Outlook-Drag-and-Drop-in-C

(Of course you should delete all the temp files after you are done will them)